"I am Didyak of the Tr'en," he said. Amenities over with, he relaxed
slightly--but no more than slightly--and came into the cell, closing
the door behind him. Korvin thought of jumping the Tr'en, but decided
quickly against it. He was a captive, and it was unwise to assume that
his captors had no more resources than the ones he saw: a small
translucent pistollike affair in a holster at the Tr'en's side, and a
small knife in a sheath at the belt. Those Korvin could deal with; but
there might be almost anything else hidden and ready to fire on him.

"What do you want with me?" Korvin said. The Tr'en speech--apparently
there was only one language on the planet--was stiff and slightly
awkward, but easily enough learned under drug hypnosis; it was the
most rigorously logical construction of its kind Korvin had ever come
across. It reminded him of some of the mathematical metalanguages he'd
dealt with back on Earth, in training; but it was more closely and
carefully constructed than even those marvels.

"I want nothing with you," Didyak said, leaning against the
door-frame. "You have other questions?"

Korvin sighed. "What are you doing here, then?" he asked. As
conversation, it wasn't very choice; but it was, he admitted, better
than solitude.

"I am leaning against the door," Didyak said. The Tr'en literalist
approach to the smallest problems of everyday living was a little hard
to get the hang of, Korvin told himself bitterly. He thought for a
second.

"Why did you come to me?" he said at last.

Didyak beamed at him. The sight was remarkably unpleasant, involving
as it did the disclosure of the Tr'en fifty-eight teeth, mostly
pointed. Korvin stared back impassively. "I have been ordered to come
to you," Didyak said, "by the Ruler. The Ruler wishes to talk with
you."

It wasn't quite "talk"; that was a general word in the Tr'en language,
and Didyak had used a specific meaning, roughly: "gain information
from, by peaceful and vocal means." Korvin filed it away for future
reference. "Why did the Ruler not come to me?" Korvin asked.

"The Ruler is the Ruler," Didyak said, slightly discomfited. "You are
to go to him. Such is his command."

Korvin shrugged, sighed and smoothed back his hair. "I obey the
command of the Ruler," he said--another ritual. Everybody obeyed the
command of the Ruler. If you didn't, you never had a second chance to
try.

But Korvin meant exactly what he'd said. He was going to obey the
comm